Author's Notes: These chapters just get longer and longer. Not that I protest too much, mind. I hope you like this; I was heading for fluffy and made it angsty instead. It's time to accept it. I can't write fluff.

Thanks to everyone who subscribed for the story – I really appreciate it – and please let me know what you think of it, because I just want to know where you want it to head and I'm generally feeling unsure about it sometimes, so... I hope you enjoy it!

Colour: Green

Prompt: An emerald necklace

The Doctor kept the light pressure of his hand over Ianto's as he slowly lowered the lever. "Come on," he encouraged gently. "Pull, then twist it sideways." When Ianto did as told, he gave him a pleased smile, even though from their position – he had plastered himself against Ianto's back – the younger Time Lord couldn't see it. "Very good. Now, that over there." He pointed at a button and a small screen on Ianto's left. "Think of the exact place and time you want to arrive at and the coordinates will show up. Then turn the Vortex Substractor all the way around three times and we'll land." Ianto turned around enough to grin at him – there was a frankly alarming glint in his eyes – and then pressed the button. The coordinates started flickering on the screen and, before the Doctor could think them through and stop him, Ianto had landed the TARDIS surprisingly smoothly. The Doctor frowned at the screen. "Earth." He wasn't sure if he was surprised or not. "The 42nd century. What do you want to come here for?"

Ianto smiled again and picked up his jacket from where he'd thrown it on one of the chairs. "Nice place to be from what I've heard. Nice time to be, mostly." His eyes were still unusually bright and the Doctor squinted.

"What are you plotting?" He asked suspiciously and his doubts intensified when Ianto just blinked innocently at him. "Me? I never have any ulterior motives. You know me well enough by now."

"Yes, I do," the Doctor sighed. "Which is why I'm so worried. Come on, then, let's see if you've managed it."

o.O.o

He turned out to have managed it just fine, as it was, and they ended up on the birthday of one of the most notable historical figures either of them had ever encountered, which in itself led to their current situation.

Helen, empress of the Second Great and Bountiful Human Empire, held the Doctor's hands in a tight grip as they waited for the music to start. She kept the same small, pleasant smile on her face and he was quite sure that it wasn't some form of pretence. From what he knew about her as a person, she had been a much loved ruler and had managed to please even the farthest planets of her empire.

The portraits he'd seen in the hallway definitely did her justice too, the Doctor thought. She was beautiful, especially by the standards of the society she lived in – medium height, long dark blond hair and dark brown eyes. She was wearing a long ceremonial dress and was covered in all sorts of trinkets from head to toe.

"Is your partner a jeweller, by any chance?" Helen asked, pulling him out of his thoughts, as the first notes of a song that sounded vaguely familiar began to play. The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "You mean Ianto? He isn't, no. Why?" She had danced with Ianto minutes ago – she had insisted to have a go with both of them, because she'd considered having Time Lords at her birthday the most exotic gift anyone could make her – and from what the Doctor had been able to see, they had had an animated conversation, which was distressing in itself. Ianto tended to cause chaos by saying several words to the wrong person, even if the topic they had – apparently – discussed seemed innocent enough.

"I was just wondering," the empress continued and the Doctor recognised the song as Cherry Bomb, which wasn't really all that surprising; all things considered, it was probably an ancient classic by now "He just seemed to be really intrigued by my necklace. It's a birthday gift from the Disheerons and he was simply enchanted."

The Doctor's gaze dropped to the jewel in question and he realised that it was indeed intriguing. The three emeralds – one in the centre, and two more on its sides – were almost too big for the fine artwork that was the rest of the necklace – and what was, as far as he could tell, first quality platinum.

"He asked me what its worth would be in the twenty-first century and I wasn't sure what to say. I mean, it would be practically priceless, wouldn't it? It would be better than anything they've seen before."

The Doctor just nodded mournfully at that, gradually realising just what was happening here. Helen – poor, clever Helen – wouldn't be the first one he'd have seen to fall for that kind of thing coming from Ianto, and she probably wouldn't be the last, which made the powerlessness he felt all the bigger.

From the several months they've been travelling together, Ianto had stolen several potentially history-changing artefacts from here and there and even the Doctor wasn't sure what he was doing it for, but he had tried to live with it. This, though, was going too far and as soon as he sat down next to the man in question, he went straight to the point. "You are not stealing the Empress's birthday gift," he said under his breath – just loud enough for Ianto to hear him – and the younger Time Lord's lips curled into a smile.

"It's not theft if I want it as a gift for someone else."

"It's not a proper gift if you've stolen it!"

"It is if nobody knows!"

The Doctor closed his eyes and sighed in exasperation. One day, just one day, he would say 'no' to Ianto's ridiculous ideas, but he suspected that it wouldn't be today. He could hardly resist even when he threw as much as a look in Ianto's direction. He wasn't doing anything special – just poking his food around his plate and occasionally throwing a glimpse in his direction from the corner of his eye. The Doctor groaned in frustration. "You said it'll be a gift. Who do you want to give it to?"

Ianto's face lit up. "Actually, my sister. Green is her favourite colour and she loves gemstones, but she could just never afford–"

"Your sister?" The Doctor interrupted. "Ianto, now you've opened the watch, she doesn't even remember you. She was a part of your cover story, nothing more. She's never even had a brother; you can't just walk into her house and give her that!"

Ianto shook his head. "She doesn't remember me, no, but she remembers something. I've went to talk to her once," he admitted sheepishly. "You were out and I decided to go and visit her and... it's like there's something missing. Even she doesn't know what it is, I can see it, but she knows that she's lost someone, even if it's a brother she doesn't remember. And she's always wanted something like that, and her husband is dumb as a brick so, as you can guess, he doesn't have the best paid job. I just want her to have something nice. And she won't even see me," he hurried to add when the Doctor opened his mouth to protest. "I promise."

And really, the Doctor thought, when he was looking at him like that, how could he resist?

o.O.o

Empress Helen, he had to admit, was rather careless when it came to her jewellery. The Doctor had picked the lock of the room where she kept all of the more pricey gifts from the night before – good thing that wood wasn't very popular at this day and age, so the screwdriver did its job perfectly – and they spotted the necklace in the moment they were in, so it didn't really take Ianto long to snatch it from its place and the Doctor turned around to the door, ready to get out as quickly as possible.

It was locked.

He fiddled with the sonic, panic already raising its head, but to no avail. Nothing worked and, really, they should have realised that it couldn't be that easy. He motioned to Ianto to come closer and tried to explain the situation through gestures.

Ianto closed his eyes and mouthed a curse feelingly, before giving the Doctor a look that could only be translated to, "What now?"

He looked around – there had to be another exit – then pointed at the opposite end of the room. Another door, this time slightly ajar. Ianto shook his head and just mouthed, "Bedroom."

Helen's bedroom, apparently, but they didn't really have much of a choice and the Doctor shrugged and made for the door, hoping that his companion would get the hint.

As soon as they got in the room, he realised that the Empress was in her bed, sound asleep and unsuspecting that the most honoured guests of her birthday party were trying to get out of her room without triggering fifty different alarms. When he sought Ianto in the darkness, the Doctor realised that he was still clutching the necklace in his hand.

He tried to make one more step but was suddenly pressed against the wall, a hand flying over his face and settling onto his mouth. After the initial shock of the perspective that they'd been found and would get locked up for the rest of their days, he realised that it was Ianto's free hand and that it was stopping him from making any noise as Helen turned in her sleep and burrowed further under her blanket.

Ianto didn't move for several more seconds, waiting for her breathing to finally go back to the relaxed rhythm of sleep, and the Doctor could feel his hearts racing from where his wrist was pressed against his cheek. Ianto was barely breathing and had pressed himself against the wall, trying to blend with it as much as he could. A few more moments passed and the Doctor dared to move as quietly as he could. When the Empress didn't look like she might wake up, the both of them made their way to the TARDIS and the Doctor found himself hoping that there were no cameras in her private chambers.

o.O.o

"We almost got caught," he said as soon as the door had closed behind them. Ianto didn't pay him much attention, still admiring the necklace in his hand with a small smile. "You're really good at sneaking through high-security rooms, though." Still no response. "Ianto... what did you do, exactly, that made the Council send you to Earth?"

Ianto finally looked at him and laughed. "It wasn't because of burglary, you can be sure of it," he said, but the Doctor didn't give up. The question had been bugging him very since they'd started travelling together and, as much as he told himself that it didn't matter, he couldn't help it. "I'm not going to tell you." Ianto's voice suggested that it was something obvious and the Doctor raised an eyebrow, "Why not?"

Ianto avoided his pointed gaze and licked his lips, then locked their eyes together. "Because you're going to hate me by the end of the story, and I don't think I can stand seeing that." The words were almost inaudible and the Doctor smiled and carefully pulled him closer and into an embrace. "Never," he vowed. "Nothing you can say could possibly make me hate you."

Ianto took a deep breath and the Doctor didn't say anything; just waited. He knew that an explanation would follow now that the other Time Lord had decided to open up.

"What do you know of the Black Sun War?"

The Doctor didn't respond at first, surprised by the direction the conversation was heading in, and then said, still a little bemused, "It's the first great Time War – long before my time, but I've heard of it. The Black Sun order attacked Rassilon and Omega while they worked on their first experiments with time. It's been an unprovoked attack and by the time I left Gallifrey, it was still a mystery just what had happened."

"It was me," Ianto said, his voice heavy with an emotion that the Doctor knew very well – shame. The shame of having nearly destroyed his home world. "I happened. When I was twenty, I wanted to start working for the Council. They thought I was too young but accepted me anyway; taught me what to do and how to do it, and the diplomatic conference that took place three months after my education started was, in their opinion, a great way to test me. They sent me there; we had to discuss a lot of things with about three hundred species and I was the only one from Gallifrey. I was meant to keep them peaceful." There was a small, bitter laugh. "But I couldn't. Vade the Valiant – the commander of the Sontaran fleet – said that he wouldn't listen to 'a boy dressed in his father's clothes'. I was expecting it, of course, so I made him listen all right, but that didn't stop him later.

"Like I said, there were hundreds of species there and yet, the elephant in the room was right between the Black Sun order and the Sontaran Empire. Both had started colonising the same planet – Antuchenth. It was basically just a big rock, it didn't even have an atmosphere, but they had managed to civilise it a bit. The Black Sun order in the East hemisphere and the Sontaran Empire in the West one, and it would take them just a few months to meet in the middle, so something had to be done. Of course, the Sontarans's idea of solution was straight up telling the Order to get away from their planet. The leader of the Order refused and they started a fight. I tried to stop them, but you know the Sontarans – he was dead before I could get to them. Turned out they have some sort of a hive mind and the others immediately knew – and, naturally, blamed me."

"It wasn't your fault," the Doctor hurried to put in. "There was nothing you could have done." Ianto just shook his head and the Doctor subconsciously placed his hand over his companion's where it was resting on the console, trying to offer comfort.

"When I got home, there was a trial held against me. As you can guess, no matter what the circumstances are, if you screw up that much, it's death for you. I didn't even protest; I knew I deserved it. Because of me, the Time Lord society would have burned before it had even been started. But there was a friend of mine – Roda, her name was – that was present, and she spoke up for me. She tried to reason with the Council; tried to tell them that it was my first assignment and that I shouldn't have been left alone and all those things, so they did the next best thing – taking away my memories and placing them in the watch. I could take it with me and I was told that if I opened it by accident, no one would come looking for me. They even allowed me to create new memories for myself. It was an act of mercy."

"No, it wasn't." The Doctor's voice was soft and he searched Ianto's face, trying to meet his eyes. "It really wasn't. But, if you look at it on the bright side, you wouldn't be alive if they hadn't sent you away then. So I should be grateful." Ianto looked away bashfully but didn't say anything and the Doctor smiled. "Now! We've got a gift for your sister. Can you give me the exact coordinates?"

Ianto nodded. "Of course. I also, eh, sort of picked up some toys for her kids. From the storage room. I was hoping you wouldn't mind." He gestured timidly to one of the chairs around the console and the Doctor saw a life-sized and extremely detailed doll – which he wasn't sure when and why he had taken from – and a Rubik's Cube with twelve different colours. He'd bought it from a human colony on the other end of the Universe, but it was still human enough for the twenty first century. "I don't mind," he assured quickly. "Do you want to get anything for her husband, too?"

"Ha."

The Doctor grinned. "Okay then. When do you want us to arrive?"

He watched as Ianto contemplated the possibilities, trying to pick a moment when he wouldn't be seen before a smile dawned on his face too. "Christmas Eve."